Because You Love Me
by s123morris
Summary: A broken Naruto is all that remains after the failure to retrieve Sasuke for a second time. Now follow as Naruto tries to fix his shattered soul with the one thing he has always wanted, Love. NaruAnko with some NaruHina NaruSaku. On Hiatus.
1. Chapter 1

Because You Love Me.

A NaruAnko Story.

1.

A blonde haired shinobi with deep cerulean eyes looked out over the Konoha village from atop the Hokage mountains with a dejected look upon his face, for although he recently was

able to save a good friend from the Akatsuki, barely, he still felt like a failure due to the fact that he was once again unable to bring back Sasuke, someone he had once considered to

be something of a brother to him, but now he saw him as nothing more then a traitor to his village and friends. This blonde shinobi went by the name of Uzumaki Naruto and he has not

looked so down since the day he failed the final exam at the Konoha Academy and felt as though he would be alone and bereft for the rest of his life, but that was also the same day as

his life took a turn for the better, for it was on this day that he was finally recognized by someone, Iruka Sensei, and he wasn't even close to being the last to do so. Over the past four

years since being made a Gennin he had helped and befriended a great many people during his missions throughout the shinobi world, from a bridge builder and his family to

princesses, priestesses and Feudal Lords. But there was still something missing from his life that he had never truly experienced before and that was that he had never felt loved, for he

believed that even his parents didn't love him for if they did how could they leave him alone to suffer the pain and ridicule from the villagers who believed him to be the monster that had

attacked the village so many years ago. It was true that the Fourth Hokage had the kyuubi sealed within an infant child, him, so that it could no longer threaten the safety of the village

and its inhabitants but he was not treated as the hero the Fourth had envisioned instead they blamed him personally for killing many of there loved ones. After helping his friend Gaara

save one of the Sands students he left to train with one of the Legendary Sannin for 2 ½ years so that one day he would be strong enough to face the Akatsuki and retrieve Sasuke

from Orichamaru, but although he had become incredibly strong it still wasn't enough, and this is were our story starts with a tear caught in the corner of a cerulean eye…

There sat Naruto with the feeling of having a hole in his heart waiting for the sun to rise over the village and awaken the people within so that he could forget his loneliness and busy

himself with the task of being a shinobi, and he actually had a plan that would occupy his mind and body at least for a while, and that was to take the Chunnin exam that was fast

approaching, he didn't like the idea of being the only Gennin in his age group left, but the problem was that he didn't know of any Konoha Gennin that would be able to take the exam

with him for you were only allowed to take it as a three man cell, he considered going to the academy and talking to Iruka about this but decided instead to go directly to the Hokage

and see what she could do to help. And so standing up and stretching out slightly cramped muscles he took one deep breath closed his eyes and leaped off the side of the mountain,

the feeling of the wind racing past his face brought a slight smile to his lips, after counting to five during his fall he righted himself so that he would land on his feet and then blasted out

a large amount of chakra from the bottom of his feet to create a cushion with which to land on. Upon landing in a sprinters crouch he took off towards the Hokage Tower as fast as he

was able, in true Naruto form he never missed an opportunity to train even a little.

Reaching the Hokage Tower Naruto slowed to a walk and headed upstairs to Tsunade' office, upon reaching her door he simply knocked and waited for permission to enter, when he

received it he walked up to her desk gave a slight bow and said "Tsunade–sama, can I talk to you for a moment?"

"Naruto, how many times have I told you not to cal…? Wait what did you just say?"

"Tsunade–sama, can I talk to you for a moment?" He repeated in a quiet and calm voice.

Tsunade realizing that something was different really took a look at the young shinobi, he stood there completely calm with no fidgety movements and definitely no foxy grin plastered

to his face, but it was the eyes that she truly looked at for there was no glint of mischief in them, actually there didn't seem to be a glint of anything in them, for although they still held

the semblance of the ocean they no longer churned and roiled with excitement. Unable to hold his gaze anymore she sat back down in her chair and motioned for him to go ahead with

a simple wave of her hand.

"Thank you, Tsunade–sama, actually I am here to see if there are any other Gennin that I might partner up with so that I can take the Chunnin exam in two weeks time." Stunned into

silence for a moment, his request finally penetrated through the turmoil of thoughts that were running through her mind as to why he was acting this way, but when it finally did she

smiled at him and answered thusly "Oh, yes, the Chunnin Exam, actually I received a request from the Kazekage this morning stating that he _knew_ that you had all the skills required to

promote you to the rank of Chunnin without having to take the exam, and as I am in full agreement with my Sand counterpart I hereb…" Tsunade stopped talking as she saw that

Naruto had raised his hand to stop her from continuing.

"Tsunade–sama, if that is indeed your decision I will of course accept it with my greatest of thanks, but before you promote me I have one simple request," he pauses waiting for the

sign that he may proceed, "It's just that when I took the Chunnin Exam last time the Third told us something just after the preliminary matches, he said that the reason that we fight in

the arena is so that we could display our skills to the rest of the Shinobi nations in the hopes that our individual villages would be granted lucrative missions, and to show the strength

of our nation. So if at all possible I would at least still like to compete in the third stage of the exam for the benefit of Konoha, I also understand that I may have to fight in a preliminary

match to advance to the finals."

She could not but help to stare at him speechless after he had finished for he hadn't raised his voice or whined or anything, he simply made a logical argument as to why he should still

fight in the last stage of the exam. "That seems reasonable, but I can't just let you fight in the third exam without going through the first two, not by my self anyway," she said with a

smile on her lips, "I will of course have to ask the Kazekage if he will allow you to do this, but I'm sure that he will not have any objections to it, actually he would probably like to watch

you fight. I will send the Kazekage a message at once and then I will inform you of his decision, you are dismissed." After saying this she had expected to finally see that foxy grin of his,

but all she saw was a slight upturning of his lips and nothing more as he turned around and left her office.

Tsunade sits at her desk with her fingers interlaced and resting under her chin as she asks as if of no one "How long has he been like this?"

From outside her window a voice is heard answering the Hokage "Actually I think he's been like this his entire life, but I only noticed it while we were away training. At first it only lasted

1 – 2 hours, then ½ day, then 2 days, then a week, and the last time that he became like this it lasted 5 weeks.

She asks worry clearly etched on her face "What's wrong with him?"

"He's broken Tsunade, his heart and soul are broken, I once asked him when the first time he felt like this was and he answered simply 'When I was 3 I realized I wasn't loved,'"

At this Tsunade starts to feel tears forming behind her eyes, "for although he has mended a little from the friends he now has he is still severely broken. But even though he is not the

energetic boy we know and love, when he was in this mood he still trained fiercely, actually he does even better."

"Better, why?"

"Because he drops the stupid act completely, don't get me wrong he's not as smart as say Sakura or Shikamaru, but he wouldn't be far behind."

"But his test scores at the Academy, and everything else?" She asked, troubled.

"Ah… yes, well that's easy to explain, self preservation, he believed that if the villagers thought him to be an idiot that they wouldn't fear and hate him as much."

"We should have taken him in from the start Jaraiya," she yelled through the tears that were now freely flowing over her cheeks, "into our homes and into our hearts."

"We weren't ready for something like that Tsunade, and you well know it." But as he said it he was no longer able to look her in the eye, the pain and grief that they showed was too

much.

"But we should have at least tried." She screamed through her tears. After this, silence descended upon the two of them until her tears had stopped and then she asked, "How long

can we expect him to continue acting like this?"

"If we're lucky 4 – 6 months," Tsunade gasps "if we're not he could stay like this forever. I just hope that he can find some middle ground between the boy we know and this new sad

version we are now familiar with." He says with a deep sigh escaping his lips.

"Middle ground," she yells standing up and slamming her hands down upon her desk "why would we want that?"

With a dejected tone of voice he says "Because Tsunade, every time he would come out of these moods and put that smile back on it tore me up inside knowing that it was only a mask,

and knowing the reason for it hurt even more."

"What reason?" She asked fearing the answer.

"Naruto didn't want anyone to be sad because of him, so he acted as if he was happy and carefree and buried his true feelings under the mask of a smiling boy." He said with a slight

catch in his throat.

Tsunade couldn't take any more and slumped back into her chair and started openly crying, with shuddering sobs she bent over and hid her face in her hands.

At hearing her Master crying Shizune came into the room to see what was wrong, when she saw her Master slumped over her desk crying she quickly came over and knelt down beside

her rubbing small circles into Tsunade' back quietly asking her what was wrong and if she needed anything. Through the crying Shizune was able to hear Tsunade ask her to tell Sakura

to meet her in Kakashi's hospital room in one hour, hearing what she wanted Shizune got up and left her Master to cry through her pain.

After leaving the Hokage tower Naruto went somewhere he had gone to every morning since returning to Konoha, he went to the library, upon entering the library he headed straight

for the section related to battles in history and proceeded to grab 3 random books off the shelf, his next stop was the General Fiction aisle and once again grabbed a book at random.

Securing the books under his arm he headed for a quiet little corner and then placed the books carefully on the floor to one side and then removed his jacket and placed that on the

other and sat him self between the two and leaned against the wall for a more comfortable reading position. After reading the history books for 2 hours he turned his attention to the

novel and with the faintest trace of a smile he looks at the cover for the first time and sees that it is in fact a romance novel, not the type Jaraiya writes of course but a proper love

story, and in his current mood it doesn't even register that it might be fairly humiliating to be caught reading something like this and just opens up the book and starts to read. After

reading it for a while he realizes that it's not just a love story, it's a tragic love story. At this point he was lying on his side with his head resting on his arm and a single tear running

down his cheek.

Elsewhere in the library a midnight blue haired Kunoichi is looking through the shelves for books on gardening, flowers, and herb lore when she spots Naruto lying on the floor with a

tear running down his cheek, and forgetting about her shyness and nervousness walked up to him and knelt down in front of him, and asks with a soft caring voice barely above a

whisper "What's wrong, Naruto?" concern, clearly visible in her eyes.

"Huh? Oh Hinata hi… nothings wrong, why do you ask?" His voice is quiet and calm, and Hinata puts this down to the fact that they're in the library. Without hesitation she places her

palm on his cheek and brushes her thumb across picking up the tear to show him.

"Oh, that, I guess I just got caught up in the story, it's really kinda sad actually." He said turning the book in his hand this way and that scrutinizing it as if to figure out its hidden

secrets.

Hinata could definitely see that he wasn't acting like his normal exuberant self, without ignoring that fact she asked him a question hoping to find out what is actually wrong with the

man she is in love with, "I didn't know you liked to read Naruto?"

"Huh, yeah, it's something Ero-Sennin got me into, he said that it was all a part of my training, I actually didn't believe him at first, until he bought me a book with lots of fights and stuff

in it, then whilst I was reading it I was able to picture myself doing some of the things they were doing in the book. They turned out to be a fairly good training manual. Then after a

while I started to read for the fun of it, at first just more action stuff, then I got into comedy, then drama, and now my very first romance novel," he said raising the book in his hand so

that she could see the cover "actually this is fairly good, you should read it some time." Through all of this Hinata noticed that not once did he yell or even raise his voice above a

murmur, and never did he smile that foxy grin of his, there was merely a turning up of the lips in the corner of his mouth.

"So Hinata why are you here today?" He asked her as if the answer was important to him.

Hinata blushed slightly lowering her lavender colored eyes from his face before answering "Oh I-I was j-just here to get some books to h-help me with my g-gardening."

"Really, what type of gardening do you do?"

"H-herbs m-mainly, but I l-love to grow flowers."

Taking his eyes off of something he knew to be truly beautiful for a moment to look at his watch he saw that he had only 5 minutes to get to the training ground, and inwardly moaned

that Hinata hadn't shown up earlier. Standing up slowly so as not to startle her he then offered his hand to assist her in standing, and although she blushed profusely she took it and

stood also, and standing as close as they were she finally noticed how tall he had grown for he now stood at about 6'3" and she had to look up to see his eyes, and then when he

spoke she could almost feel the vibrations flowing through her body "I'm sorry Hinata, but I have to get to the training grounds now, but… but if you like I'm here for 3 hours every

morning when I don't have a mission, so if you would like to hang around and read with me sometime that would be fun," He said with just the hint of the foxy smile that Hinata loved,

and she just nodded her head a little and blushed even deeper then before "good, I get here about 6:30. I'll see you around Hina." He said with a small wave over his shoulder, and

quickly left for the training grounds.

Hinata couldn't quite believe what had just happened and lowered her eyes to where he had been lying when first she arrived and noticed that he forgotten to pick up his jacket off the

floor. She bent down and tentatively reached out her hand and wrapped her fingers around it and crushing it to her chest. Closing her eyes she drew the jacket up to her face and took

a deep shuddering breath taking in the smell of him as best as she could, and thinking over the way in which he had acted, for although she was extremely worried about his strange

behavior she still smiled to herself just happy that she was able to talk to him again after 2 ½ very long years away from her. And her smile only grew when she remembered how he

called her 'Hina'.


	2. Chapter 2

Because You Love Me.

Part 2: Training

In a hospital room where Kakashi was still recovering from chakra exhaustion reading his much loved 'Icha Icha' books stood a man staring out of the window trying to work out how they were going to help Naruto once and for all, he did at least have one idea but he knew that the others would never agree to it thinking that he was just being a pervert. He also knew that such things had to happen of there own accord, otherwise it was just another mask masquerading as happiness. He was still thinking about the young man he loved as a son when Tsunade and Sakura entered the room, Tsunade sat on the edge of Kakashi' bed and Sakura sat in the chair that was located next to it.

"I guess he filled you in on what's going on," Tsunade said looking at Kakashi, at her look he closed his book and laid it down on his lap before giving her a quiet nod, "So what do you think?"

But before he could answer Sakura gently enquired "What is this all about, what am I doing here?"

Kakashi looks towards Tsunade who gave him the nod to explain things to her "Well, Sakura it seems as though Naruto has been lying to us from the very start…" And continues to tell Sakura what he himself was still trying to work out the repercussions of. Before he had gone through half of the story tears were flowing freely from Sakura' eyes and by the end she desperately needed the comfort that Tsunade offered. Once Kakashi had finished they all sat quietly trying to get a grip on there own emotional states, after Sakura had calmed herself somewhat Kakashi answered the question Tsunade had asked of him "I think that we should give _it_ to him."

Tsunade and Jaraiya although completely shocked at the idea were still thinking about it.

"What is '_It_'?" Sakura asked of no one in particular, and it was Jaraiya that answered her "Just something that was left to him."

"Yes, I think he's old enough now, and definitely skilled enough." For although Tsunade knew what she said was true she still didn't look to happy about it.

"Very well then, but who are we going to get to train him?" Jaraiya asked.

"Someone has already promised to do so." Tsunade replied.

"Who?" Kakashi asked.

"Anko." At the name Sakura gave a visible shudder, but the others just nodded in agreement.

"They have the same type of fighting style, aggressive yet fluid, he should do well." Jaraiya announced.

"So we are all agreed, then I will have them start there training tomorrow." Tsunade said before telling the others about how Naruto had turned down his promotion and his wanting to fight in third stage of the Chunnin Exam.

"But why wouldn't he just take the promotion, I know he doesn't like being the only Gennin left in our age group." Sakura said.

Tsunade then tells them the reason that Naruto had given her, "And also I think that he wants to feel as though he has earned it." They all fell into a thoughtful silence and all had to agree with Tsunade' insight. "Sakura I want you to bring Naruto to my office at 2 o'clock ok, and see that a message is sent to Anko to be there as well, oh and Sakura there is no need to tell her what this about." And with that said she stood up from the bed and left the room heading back to her office.

Just as Naruto left the library a small smile appeared on his face, he had left his jacket behind on purpose, what that purpose was he was keeping to himself. And so sped off to the training ground, when he arrived he couldn't see Yamato anywhere but just when he was about to go look for him in the village he heard someone shout out his name "Naruto, hey Naruto, what are you doing here?" Turning towards the sound he saw that it was Konohamaru who was calling his name and running towards him followed closely by Moegi and Udon. Naruto just stood where he was waiting for them to come to him, when they were close enough that he wouldn't have to raise his voice to be heard he answered Konohamaru' question "Well Maru, I'm actually looking for Yamato so we can continue my training." Konohamaru just looked at Naruto trying to work out what was different about him, and when he realized what it was he didn't like, then what Naruto had called him finally caught up to him.

"Naruto, why did you just call me 'Maru'?"

"Isn't it obvious, it's your nickname?" He replied as if Konohamaru should have known, "Why, don't you like it?"

Konohamaru couldn't help it but he had to yell his answer "Are you kidding me it's awesome." He turned to Moegi and Udon and points his finger at them and says "From now on you guys have to call me Maru." The smile on Maru' face was the one that usually sat upon Naruto'. Then he turned back to face Naruto and with his smile still in place he said "Yamato and the other team captains got called into a meeting, don't know how long they're going to be but it could be a while, which is really annoying because I really wanted to train today." His smile slipping a little at the end but then it returned in full force as he pointed his finger again, but this time at Naruto and said "You are going to train us for the Chunnin Exam."

"Huh? So you guys are taking the exam this time round." He said thinking it through. All three of the younger Gennin just smiled at him and nodded, "Well, I guess I could help out a little." After thinking what he was going to do with them he said, "So first things first tree climbing exercise." And with that said he heads over to a stand of trees points to them and tells them to get on with it. He watched as they ran towards a tree each and started to climb, and just like him when he was their age he also had to use a lot of momentum to get to the top of the tree, but these three ran out of steam about ¾ of the way up, all he thought when he saw this is that they would have to work on that a bit, then he nodded to them with the hint of a smile and said "Second exercise water walking." And walked over to the river that ran through the training ground and then onto it, once in the middle of the river he turned around and gestured for them to come to him. Although they looked a little apprehensive about this they did slowly make their way towards him, as they made their way across he noticed that they all sank about an inch into the water, and made a mental note to himself that he would have to get them to work on that as well. Once again he nodded and moved away this time to the centre of the training ground and then said over his shoulder loud enough for them to hear him "Third exercise replacement jutsu." And giving them the count of 3 he spun around on the spot and threw a kunai at each of them, after he saw the impact of each kunai and a puff of white smoke from each he turned around to face the three young Gennin who stood there with broad smiles on each of their faces, he nodded once more but this time his smile was just a little bit more prominent. "Not bad everyone, some work still needs to be done but not bad. Now it's time for exercise four individual combat, so who wants to go first how about you Maru?" Maru looks up at him for a minute worrying about his own personal safety when Naruto says "Don't worry, I'm just going to defend myself for now, I just want to check out your speed and strength in a fight, then once you have all come against me by yourselves then we will move on to group fighting, ok?" Maru looked a lot more relieved after hearing this, and immediately pulls a kunai from his holster and charges at Naruto. After a few hours of intense training, for the young Gennin' anyway, Naruto tells them that they will take a break and talk about how they did.

At one o'clock Sakura leaves the hospital in search of Naruto. Figuring that he would be at Ichiruka' for lunch she starts to head there when she suddenly sees a black and orange jacket disappearing around a corner up ahead and so running after the jacket and calling for them to wait up, upon catching up outside of Ichiruka' Sakura realizes that is in fact not Naruto wearing the jacket but Hinata. "Hinata… what are you doing wearing Naruto' jacket?" Sakura asked with barely a hint of jealousy entering her voice.

"Huh..? Um… well you see I-I um… ran into N-Naruto in the library and when he l-left he forgot to take his jacket with him, a-and I thought that I w-would take it with m-me and give it to him w-when I saw him n-next." The blush on Hinata' face was so fierce, that Sakura could almost imagine steam coming out of her ears. But when her words finally sunk in she couldn't control her shock and yelled, "Naruto was in the library?"

"Y-Yes, when I saw him h-he was reading a ro… um a novel." She was glad that she hadn't let slip that Naruto had in fact been reading a romance novel; she didn't think he would want that bit of information getting out. Sakura was so surprised at hearing this she just stood there flabbergasted, trying to draw together the image she had of Naruto and the one Hinata had just mentioned she just couldn't do it. When Sakura' mind was once again able to function her eyes immediately locked onto Naruto' jacket and asked the girl in it, "So why are wearing his jacket?" the strain of keeping her jealously in check made her voice sound almost threatening. Hinata was unable to look at Sakura as she mumble her answer in barely a whisper but Sakura was able to hear, "…to be close to him…" trying to keep her voice as calm as possible she asked "So do you know where he was headed after he left the library? I have to go get him because Tsunade–Sama wants to see him." Sakura added feeling as though she had to rationalize her reason for going to see him to Hinata. Hinata nodded her head and told her that he was going to the training grounds, before Sakura left for the training grounds she told Hinata that she would return Naruto' jacket to him. Although Hinata didn't want to lose the comfort of being wrapped up in the jacket she had no choice but to hand it over to Sakura, when it was in her hands Sakura gripped it like she would never let go. And so with jacket in hand she left Hinata at Ichiruka' and headed towards the training grounds, when she had turned a corner and was out of Hinata' view she slipped her arms through the sleeves and rejoiced in the feeling of wearing something that belonged to the man that she had fallen for, and so with a private little smile playing on her lips she went to find the one who always made her feel as though she was special.

When Sakura arrived at the training grounds she saw Naruto sitting on the ground with Konohamaru, Moegi and Udon; when she got close enough for her to hear what Naruto was saying she just couldn't help but to smile. She could hear him telling the others about what they had done wrong, what they needed to improve but he spent most of the time telling them what they did right and that he was proud of their current level of skills while still emphasizing the need to continue to work hard. After a while of just staring at him Sakura was finally noticed by the others and Konohamaru called out to her to join them, as she started to walk towards them Naruto turned around to her and she stopped dead in her tracks, she could clearly see what Tsunade and Jaraiya were talking about, his face held no trace of his foxy grin and his eyes seemed to be void of any emotion whatsoever, but when he looked at her she could see a hint of amusement in his eyes and then he said, "Nice jacket, where'd you get it? It looks a little big on you." Then she looked down and saw that she was still wearing _his _jacket and blushed a little as she then proceeded to tell him that she ran into Hinata at Ichiruka' and shrugged as if to say 'and there you have it', after she finished she went to take it off but he waved her to stop and stood and walked to her and said, "Still, I think it is still too big for you." And with that he made some rapid hand signs and then grabbed a lapel in each hand near her chest, which made her blush even more, then she noticed that the jacket was actually becoming tighter on her arms and torso and once it became a snug fit showing off what curves she had it stopped and he released his hold on the jacket, "There, now that's a better fit." He said standing back from her so he could see how it looked on her and simply nodded his head in approval and said "Perfect fit, I also like how the orange of the jacket goes with the pink of your hair." She felt joyous as she heard him say this and meekly said "Thank you, but now you don't have a jacket. And by the way how did you make it fit me so perfectly?" At this question she saw it again, a hint of amusement in his eyes and he answered thusly, "Oh, well, you see Ero-Sennin taught me that little trick, but I never used it the way he did." Sakura tilted her head slightly as if to ask 'what do you mean the way he did?', "Well it being Ero-Sennin he mainly used it to make the cute girls clothes really tight so that he could do his 'research' better, I guess he did rub off on me a little after all." He said still looking at Sakura in his former jacket, and he had to admit that she looked _really_ cute in it. He could see that Sakura' blush had deepened and said "And I just bought a new jacket yesterday, I just forgot to wear it today because I'm so used to putting that one on, but seeing as how I don't need that one anymore I guess you can keep it, if you want that is?" She could only nod that she would indeed be keeping his jacket, and she couldn't help but get a thrill as she thought about the expression Hinata was going to have when she saw Sakura wearing Naruto' jacket and a smile appeared on her face which only added to her cuteness as far as Naruto was concerned. Then Sakura finally remembered the reason why she was looking for Naruto and told him that Tsunade wanted to see the both of them at two o'clock in her office.

As he began to make his way to the Hokage' office Naruto said over his shoulder, "I'll see you guys later, oh and by the way good work keep it up, see ya." And with a small wave over his shoulder he and Sakura walked away from the training grounds with barely any space between them and as they walked their fingers would brush against the others…


	3. Chapter 3

Because You Love Me

Part 3: Gift

Jaraiya and Tsunade were waiting in her office for Naruto and Sakura to arrive when Jaraiya asks "Are you sure of this?" With a knock at the door she answers quickly with a yes to Jaraiya and tells the others to come in. Tsunade could not look Naruto in the eye so she took in Sakura' appearance and had to hide a smile behind her hands for she could clearly tell that she was wearing Naruto' jacket. "Naruto, the reason that I called you here is because there is something that we have to give you." Naruto looked at her for moment thinking, there was no shock, no surprise, and no expectation that any of them could see and then he asked "We?" Tsunada looks to Sakura to see if she told him anything, but all she received was a slight shake of the head. To Tsunade it felt as though her heart was crying out in pain, and she had to look down at her desk so that the others could not see the pain in her eyes, and then she answered his question, "Yes, Jaraiya myself and Kakashi." When she looked up at him she saw a flicker of comprehension in his eyes, but then it was replaced by the ocean void once again. Tsunade motioned towards the long rectangular wooden box on her desk that had the Konoha symbol imprinted on the lid, he walks to the desk and the box and then releasing the catch slowly opens it. What is revealed inside was a katana; the hilt was wrapped in four different colours black, red, orange and white, the scabbard was essentially black gloss with red, orange, and white imprints of the Konoha leaf symbol, the third part of the katana was the scabbard shoulder strap which depicted a red and orange flame design. Naruto merely studies it for a while closes the lid picks the box up by the handle and says "Thank you, but why are you giving it to me now?"

"How else are you going to train with it?" Jaraiya said with what could only have been a forced laugh. While Jaraiya was laughing Anko walks into the office and takes a seat on the corner of Tsunade' desk and without any preamble asks "So what did you want to see me for?" But then she sees Naruto holding the box and she quickly gets up and moves away from Tsunade shaking her head vigorously.

"You have already promised to do this Anko; you can't get out of this now." Tsunade says with a smirk lighting her face.

"Judging from Anko-sama' reaction I assume that she will be the one to teach me how to use this," Naruto said motioning to the box in his hand, "I look forward to your instruction Anko… sensei."

At the last word Anko visibly shuddered, but then she really took a look at Naruto and placed a resigned expression on her face, "Fine, 10 o'clock, Waterfall Training Grounds." And with that said she leaves the office, keeping her eye on Naruto until she had past by him on the way to the door, and with one last look at Naruto she closes the door behind her.

Jaraiya clearly stunned tells the others "Well that was easier then I thought it would be."

"Indeed." Tsunade replied and then looking at Naruto and Sakura she says to them "You two are dismissed." And with that they both bow and leave her office. Once Tsunade was sure they were out of ear shot she said to Jaraiya "Did you see that? He didn't even react when I said we had something for him."

"Yes, but he did react when you told him who it was from. I do hope he can handle Anko."

"Me too."

Walking out of the Hokage Tower Naruto quickly says goodbye to Sakura for he felt like being alone for a while, and so heads off home carrying his new sword. He knew as soon as he heard who it was from that it had once belonged to the Forth, for although he did not know the details of the relationship between the Forth and Tsunade, he knew that they had been at least close friends. The Forth' relationship to the other two was fairly simplistic actually for Jaraiya had trained the Forth, and the Forth had trained Kakashi, and so with thoughts such as this he went home.

When he got home he deposited the wooden box on his kitchen table and then proceeded to get a cold drink from the fridge before retreating to the lounge to just relax and watch some TV before he had dinner, but for the duration of the night he was only able to think and wonder about his upcoming training with Anko. He remembered well the first time he had met her, and he isn't embarrassed to admit that she had scared him some back then, but when he saw her for the first time in years in the Hokage' office there was only one thought running through his mind 'Damn she's Hot!' and with that thought he fixed himself some instant ramen before retiring to his bedroom and going to sleep wondering what tomorrow would bring.

The next morning Naruto got up had breakfast had a shower and then proceeded to get dressed for the day to come, his outfit was as it always was except for the new jacket that he slipped his arms through, he had had it custom made, the jacket itself was pretty much the same as his old one except the orange on the sides had been replaced with a dull white and on the back in his customary orange was his design for the Konoha Eleven, also whereas the old one had been baggy this new one was more snug fitting. And so zipping up his new jacket he went to the kitchen table and opened the wooden box once more and reverently removed the sword, slinging the sword around his shoulder and over his head he was able to secure it onto his back so that the hilt was located over his right shoulder for easy reach. And so checking that he had everything he needed for today's training he left for his morning trip to the library.

When he reached the library he got his usual 3 random history books and 1 random novel before proceeding to his usual reading place, he removed the sword from his back propping it up against the wall and then taking off his jacket and tossing that on the floor he sat down and started to read. After 15 minutes of reading he sensed Hinata enter the library and head in his direction, but right now he really didn't want to be distracted because he was really enjoying the history book he was reading. When she reached his position, before she could say anything he said without taking his eyes off the book, "You can sit down and read with me if you'd like." And he heard her making herself comfortable and pulled out a book of her own to read. They had been reading quietly together when Naruto realized that it was getting close to the time he had to meet Anko at the Waterfall Training Grounds, he sat up and put his book down onto the others and grabbing his jacket he stood up and put it on turning around to reach for his sword when heard a voice behind him "Is that a new jacket Naruto, didn't Sakura return your other one to you?" Hinata asked a little exacerbated thinking that Sakura had kept it for herself.

"Oh, yes she did return it to me, it's just that I bought this one a couple of days ago and told her she could keep my old one. So do you like my new jacket?" He asked standing there while she looked up at him with desire clearly etched in her eyes, "It's magnificent, but I've never seen that design on the back before, what does it mean?"

"It's our symbol, you know the Konoha Eleven? I designed it myself." And with that said he continued to retrieve his sword and secure it on his back, and with an apologetic goodbye he left for his new round of training.

As Naruto entered the Waterfall Training Ground he noticed that that was all there was, a waterfall and a river, but even though the area was fairly sparse the majestic waterfall before him more then compensated. Sensing someone behind him he slowly turned around to see Anko looking at him as if she had forgotten how to talk, Naruto gave her a slight bow and said, "Good morning Anko-sensei." His voice seemed to have pulled her out of her thoughts and she grimaced at the title.

"Please, just call me Anko." He bowed his head to her indicating that he would do so from now on, when he looked at her again he noticed the sword that was in her hand, it resembled his own in every way except that where his was black hers was white and a small knowing small reached his lips as he said, "I see now why you were chosen to teach me how to use a sword, they're partner blades aren't they?" To say that she was shocked to hear that he knew what they're blades were was a bit of an understatement.

"They are, but how did you know that?"

His simple answer was "I've been reading a lot of history over the past couple of years," she was about to say something when he continued on with his answer, "And also when you showed up I could almost feel my sword pulse, as if it were greeting an old friend."

Now this totally caught her off guard, for her to feel the pulse of her sword was one thing but for this young man to have felt it too was extraordinary. But it was what he said next that almost made her pass out from the shock "So your sword once belonged to Kushina, as mine once belonged to her husband Minato the Forth Hokage." She merely stared in stunned silence with a question clearly written on her face 'now how the hell did you know that?' and he of course answered the unspoken question "When you put enough pieces together the picture soon becomes clear." And with that Zen like answer she snapped out of her shocked state, and decided they had wasted enough time already and now it was time to see what he could actually do. "Times a wastin', lets get you trained already, but first I need that." She said pointing to his forehead protector. The Naruto of old would have yelled and screamed his refusal but this one merely thought it through before reaching up and untying it from his head, and holding it in his hands as if it were fragile he handed it over to her, "Take care of it, it's precious to me." Anko could have sworn that he was talking about his heart or soul and not his forehead protector, and maybe he was. "You can have it back when you have completed your training." Naruto merely nodded his head indicating that he understood, without the headband to hold back his hair it now fell around his eyes making him appear to be a hunter on the prowl.

"I'll start you off slow for now, at the moment all I want you to do is copy my movements as best as you can."

"Anko, are we starting off on the water or under the waterfall?" She was now beyond being shocked by his knowledge and understanding of things and simply answered the question.

"We'll just start out on the water for now, but once you've got the basics down then we'll move under the waterfall for the more advanced stuff." As she pictured him glistening with water an intense thrill coursed through her body.


	4. Chapter 4

Because You Love Me.

Part 4: Ikimono-Supai

A week had passed since he started his training with Anko and Naruto had received permission to fight in the Chunnin Exams which would start in one week, and then six days after that would be the preliminary matches, if indeed there was a need for them. Naruto had noticed that his life had become fairly routine; he would spend his mornings with Hinata in the library reading and talking quietly, then he had 6 hours of training with Anko, and after that he would spend some time walking around Konoha with Sakura. Every now and then he could sense that Hinata and Sakura were watching him train with Anko, although they never did so together and they were always hiding out of sight, but he always knew when they were there, and today was no different he could sense both of them watching from the cover of the trees as he had a training match with Anko. She would point out his faults and directed him in how to do it properly; taking him through the motions slowly and sometimes she even had to take a hold of individual body parts to make sure that his movements were just right. This early in his training they still hadn't made it under the waterfall, during this training match Naruto was pushing Anko harder then he had on any other previous day, as they were concentrating hard on each other they moved at the same time, they stepped forward with their guard up crossing the two blades before their heaving chests and trying to push the other back they both leaned forward looking the other straight in the eye, their faces mere inches apart breathing heavily into each others face. For when one of them breathed out the other would breathed in, and this was exactly what they had been trying to achieve, their hearts even raced at the same speed. When Anko slightly nodded her head indicating that they had achieved what she desired the both of them relaxed their bodies immediately, after they had slowed their breathing and heart rates out of the blue Anko asked, "Naruto, how old are you?" she had actually wanted to ask this before but something always seemed to get in the way. Sure she could've asked Kakashi or Tsunade and Jaraiya, or even one of his friends but she was sure they would want to know why she was asking.

Naruto tilted his head as if to ask that exact question but answered even without having to know the answer to the unspoken question, bending down he picked up two bottles of water and throwing one to Anko who snatched it cleanly out of the air he said, "Soon I'll be 18."

"Thank you, how soon?" She asked barely containing her curiosity, and taking a deep drink of her water.

"The 10th." Was his only answer as he too took a drink.

"The 10th, as in 3 days from now?" She asked. Naruto merely nodded his head in confirmation of what Anko had asked, "Well, what are your plans then, turning 18 is fairly momentous you know?"

"I plan on being with you…" as he paused he could clearly see that her cheeks had become a little flush and that there was a flicker of excitement in her eyes as well, "training." Naruto could almost see the disappointment when he added that last word.

"Yes, but after training don't you have anything planned with your friends?"

"I didn't tell them."

"Why not? I'm sure that they would like to know that your birthday is coming up."

"It's a day of mourning and remembrance, who would want to celebrate anything on such a day?" He replied.

The words were so softly spoken that not even Naruto was able to hear Anko say "I would." But in a louder voice she said "Well if you're not going to celebrate your birthday then I guess I'm just going to have to think of something special to teach you, during our training that day. But I don't have any idea what that's going to be yet." A smile danced on her face and in her eyes as she laughed nervously trying to think of something she could teach him.

Changing the subject away from himself he asked, "So considering that you will be to busy training me, who has taken over as proctor for the Forrest of Death?"

Forced out of her contemplation by his question she said, "Oh, um, I think Neji has been given the job." With that said they went back to Naruto' training, and after a few more hours of punishing physical exertion, they said their goodbyes for the day and Naruto watched as Anko headed off towards the Hokage tower. Wanting to know what she was going to do a small smile graced his lips as he executed a jutsu that he had developed for Ero-Sennin and then he walked off to Ichiruka' to sate his burning hunger, while still keeping an eye on Anko.

When Anko reached the Hokage' office she was panting a little, for as soon as she was out of Naruto' view, or so she thought, she had ran here as fast as she was able and barging through the door she almost shouted, "Naruto turns 18 in three days." She said it as though something terrible had happened.

"Anko, I know how old Naruto is, I delivered him after all." Tsunade said, although it was clear by the tone in her voice that she wanted to know what had caused this reaction in Anko.

"And do you also know what he is planning to do for his birthday?" Anko asked panic could be clearly heard in her voice. Tsunade merely shook her head dreading the answer that was to come. "He plans on training, that's it, nothing else, no friends, no party, no presents." Anko had now gone into hysterics, and Tsunade could see that her eyes had become moist with unshed tears.

Tsunade was almost on the verge of tears herself when she said angrily, "Well that's not going to happen."

Meanwhile at Ichiruka' Naruto had met up with Sakura for some ramen; they had just ordered their food when Sakura said, "So Naruto how is your training with Anko going?" Naruto tilts his head and looks at her for a moment before responding with, "Well enough I suppose, considering that people are always watching me." Sakura blushed deeply hiding her face in her hands, the thought that he knew that she was watching him train embarrassed her to no end. And then he continued as if he hadn't noticed her reaction and said, "But now that Anko has it in her head to have some sort of birthday party for me, I'm sure that she is going to be slightly unfocused for the next couple of days, you might also find Tsunade distracted as well, they're both trying to come up with something right now, oh wait," he said holding up a finger for a second, "no Tsunade just decided to give you the job of organizing it."

Sakura looked at him in complete shock, "How do you know what Tsunade just decided to do?"

"I've been watching Anko since she left me at the training grounds, wait Tsunade just sent a messenger to come find you."

"Watching her how, did you have a shadow clone follow her?"

"No, of course not," he said with all honesty, "it's a new technique I developed for Ero-Sennin."

"What type of technique?" She asked afraid of the answer.

"Intelligence gathering, you see when I was with Ero-Sennin training he always got us into trouble because of all of his peeking, and I knew that he would never stop so I thought up a way for him to 'gather data' without being caught."

"How?" Sakura asked she knew that Tsunade would want to know that Jaraiya had a way of spying on women without getting caught.

"It's actually pretty hard to explain but I'll try anyway, let me think. I guess the easiest way to describe it is as a mixture of shadow clone, transformation, and summoning jutsu you see you use all three so that you can bring forth an animal that has a constant information feed back to the user, so that you are able to direct what it does with your thoughts. And the good thing about this is that you can change the animal to something different every time, so that it is less likely to be caught spying, of course Ero-Sennin can only bring out a pigeon. So there you have it, I call it Ikimono-Supai (Animal Spy)."

To say that Sakura was shocked was an understatement, for Naruto to come up with such a high level intelligence technique was beyond amazing, it was extraordinary, "How long does it take to learn this new technique of yours?"

"Well, I don't know, it took Ero-Sennin 5 weeks to be able to bring forth his pigeon and he was practicing everyday all day, but for someone else it would probably take at least a year because they would have to learn how to use the three other techniques first."

"And how long did it take you to create it?"

"Oh, it took me a bit over a week I guess." With this statement they heard a loud crashing coming from the kitchen, "You alright in there Teuchi, any injuries?" Naruto asked concern evident in his voice.

"No, no we're both fine, sorry about that, don't let me interrupt your meal, eat, eat." He said poking his head around the corner smiling at him.

"Are you sure there aren't any injuries, we do have one of the best med-nin' sitting right here you know?" Naruto asked again just to be sure.

"No, no ones injured, just some broken bowls is all." And with that he went back to clean up the mess he had made. And with that they continued to eat their meal until the messenger arrived for Sakura, they said their goodbyes and she left.

As Sakura reached the Hokage' office she knocked and waited for permission to enter, when she entered the office her eyes automatically went straight to the white dove that was sitting on the window ledge and she just had to smile at it knowing that Naruto was still watching everything. Sakura walked up to the desk and bowed and before Tsunade said anything she said, "I know that you want me to organize a party for Naruto' birthday, and I would be honored to do so."

The two other women in the room were clearly shocked that Sakura would already know what was going on when Tsunade said, "How do you know about that?" Sakura merely pointed to the bird and said one word "Naruto." At the word the dove flew over to Sakura and landed on her shoulder rubbing its head against her cheek and she let out a giggle, "Naruto, stop that it tickles." She said to the bird. The bird stopped but it just hopped a little away from her cheek and continued to watch.

"What do you mean 'Naruto'?" Tsunade asked clearly annoyed

"You see Naruto said that he was curious to see what Anko was going to do after he told her about his birthday, so he 'Brought Forth' this little guy to follow her," as Sakura said this the dove took off and landed of Anko' shoulder and also caressed her cheek, which Anko couldn't help but giggle at, Sakura along with her, "and he has been listening in on your conversation from the very beginning, and still is." The other two were worried now, they were each going over everything they had said and how they acted, but the dove merely caressed Anko' cheek once more before flying over to Tsunada to do the same, as it to say 'thank you'. Tsunade giggled as well at the attention of the dove and reached up and scratched its chest, she then froze as realization came to her and turned to Sakura and asked "What do you mean by 'Brought Forth'?" Sakura then went on to tell them about how Naruto had created his 'Ikimono-Supai' and then told Tsunade to watch out for pigeons the next time she was at the hot springs. Tsunade and Anko were entranced by the story that Sakura was telling them and once she finished Anko asked the same question she did "How long does it take to learn this 'Ikimono-Supai'?"

"Naruto said that it would take at least a year, he also said that it would take so long because they would have to learn how to use the three other techniques first. And even if you already know how to use them individually it will still take some time, it took Jaraiya 5 weeks working on it everyday all day and he can only bring out the one animal."

"You mean to tell me that Naruto can choose what animal he brings out." Tsunade asked in wonderment. Sakura could only nod her head in affirmation. "So we never know if it's just an animal or Naruto watching us." At these words Sakura and Anko slightly blushed. Then Tsunade asked a question she had never even considered, "How many animals can he bring out at once?"

"I have no idea Tsunade-Sama, I didn't think to ask him, but I guess you could ask him." she said pointing to the dove that was still perched on Tsunade' shoulder. The three women looked at the dove to see if they would get an answer, and then it disappeared in a puff of white smoke just as Naruto came walking through the office door and he answered the question they had asked of the bird, "It all depends on the size of the animals, for something like doves and the like I could probably bring forth about a thousand or so, and if it was something bigger say the size of a tiger I could maybe do 35, and once I played a trick on Ero-Sennin and brought forth a dragon, I can only do one of those though." He said a little disappointed at his limitations.

"A d-dragon?" Tsunade screeched.

"Oh yeah, scared the crap out of Ero-Sennin it did, it was hilarious." He said with a true smile gracing his face for the first time in a long time, it wasn't his foxy grin but at least this one was real.

"But you can't control a dragon, it's impossible." Sakura said clearly shaking.

He gave a sigh of exasperation he thought he had already explained this to her, "It wasn't a true dragon Sakura, it was me in a dragon body, here I'll show you what I mean." He said then looking at Anko, he started his technique, there were at least 30 hand seals for it but it wasn't this that had them staring at him in confusion, because they knew that the harder the jutsu the more hand seals are needed, no what confused them was that he was making them with his hands about a foot apart from each other and then he said 'Ikimono-Supai jutsu' and there before him stood a white tiger and a black panther, grace and power etched into every fiber of their beings. They walked over to Anko and started to rub themselves against her legs acting like house cats who just want to be scratched when he said "The namesakes of our swords." After she got over the shock of the large cats rubbing themselves against her she started to bend down to scratch them when the thought struck her 'This is actually Naruto doing this to me' and she blushed profusely and looked at him and she could see a mischievous little smirk on his face. "I think you might have spent too much time with Jaraiya, Naruto." At her words the other two were completely shocked as they too finally realized what was happening, but he merely answered with "Maybe." Sakura looked like she was going to punch him but then Tsunade started to laugh so hard she almost fell out of her chair, after a moment the other two started to join in as well and Naruto moved the two cats so that the tiger went to Tsunade and the panther went to Sakura. When the tiger reached Tsunade' chair it put its two front paws on the arm rests and started to lick her face which only increased her laughing fit, while this was happening the panther was continually circling Sakura rubbing against her legs and every now and then it's tail would wrap around one of her legs and then un-spool when it continued to circle caressing her thigh. Sakura was blushing immensely as she actually pictured Naruto' hands doing that to her but just before she was going to let slip a moan of pleasure he called the cats away the panther to sit at his side and the tiger to sit by Anko, "I think I did spend too much time with Ero-Sennin." The mischievous smirk still evident on his face, "But you get the idea right? They are me and I am them, they follow my direction and do whatever I need them to do." As he paused in his explanation he waited for their nod of understanding before continuing, "But unlike the Shadow Clones I don't gain their knowledge when they dissipate, I receive it as it happens, which is how I was able to walk in here at the right moment." Tsunade could see the advantages of having such a technique, but the possibility to train large numbers in it would be impossible and then a question came to her, 'Naruto, how much chakra did you use to make each of those?" Naruto was silent for a while thinking about it trying to gauge just how much chakra he used, but when he answered it pretty much floored the three women, "About as much as Shikamaru has."

"And what about the dove earlier?" Tsunada asked.

"About five Shadow Clones worth." He replied after thinking about it for a moment.

"And how long do they last?"

"Until they are killed, dispelled, or the user is killed, once they have life they retain it, but it does get fairly annoying seeing another perspective all the time in your head which is why it is wise to dispel them when they are not needed." He explained.

"Yes, of course. Do you think you could teach others this technique?" Naruto could tell that Tsunada wanted to share his technique around.

"I will only teach it to those I trust completely, oh and just so you know I've made it so that only I can teach it, if anyone else attempts to pass on the technique the knowledge will be erased from their minds forever." The way he said the last sentence made Tsunade feel as though it wasn't just a warning but a threat.

"Fair enough, do you have someone in mind of who you're going to teach it to first?"

"Actually I thought I would teach Kakashi first, even though he won't be able to copy it with his Sharingan he is still considered a genius, so he should be able to pick it up at least as fast as Jaraiya. But I won't be teaching anyone anything until I've become a Chunnin." The three women were clearly confused about something and he finally found out what it was when Anko asked, "What do you mean Kakashi won't be able to copy the technique with his Sharingan?"

"Oh, that, it's just another security precaution I put into it like the mind erase." And with that he bowed to the three women and walked out the door with the panther walking gracefully by his side. Even though he had left the room they knew that he was still there in the form of the white tiger that stared up at Anko from its sitting position by her side.

"What did Jaraiya teach him?" Sakura asked, "How could he block the abilities of the Sharingan?"

"Jaraiya didn't teach him that, as far as I know the only thing that can't be copied by the Sharingan is a Blood Line Limit. No, Jaraiya didn't teach him that at all." Tsunade said looking at the tiger she felt sure would stay with Anko until she reached the safety of her home. "Well Sakura what ideas do you have for Naruto' birthday?" And with that the three of them went about organizing a party for a truly amazing man.


	5. Chapter 5

Because You Love Me.

Part 5: Friends

The following morning Naruto arrived at the Waterfall Training Grounds to find Maru and his team waiting for him, and for some reason Maru didn't look like he was happy with Naruto, but when he was about ten feet away Maru started to point his finger and yell at Naruto, "You're fighting in the Chunnin exam, and you don't even have to take the first two test, how did you pull that off, you cheater?"

"I received special dispensation." Naruto replied calmly.

"Yeah, from who?" Maru asked still yelling.

"Let me see now there is the Hokage, the Kazekage, two Feudal Lords, 3 Princesses and a High Priestess, and a few others, well at least they're who Tsunade said anyway, why do you ask?" He replied calmly once again.

The list of important personages had at least done the job of quieting down Maru but it didn't negate the fact that he still didn't know why Naruto got to skip two tests, and so asked "So why do you only have to fight in the final test?" in a much lower volume of voice.

"Actually I didn't have to fight at all, Tsunade was just going to promote me straight away, but I asked her if I could fight in the third stage of the exams and then she went around and asked some important people if they would allow it and they did, and that's basically it. Why do you want to know not worried about facing me in a match are you?"

"No of course not, I just wanted to know what was going on is all." Although Maru said it with a smile on his face Naruto could still see that they were all actually worried about the prospect.

"I'll make you a deal," as soon as he said this they all looked up with renewed hope in their eyes, "if by chance I am matched up against any of you in the finals I will allow you to go all out on me and I will only defend myself, just like we did in training, but for me to do this there is something that I need you all to promise me."

"What?" All three chorused at once.

"Once you run out of chakra, you have to give up."

"'Give up' we don't give up." Maru said proudly.

"You will if you don't want me to beat you within 5 seconds of the match beginning." Naruto said this as cold as possible, just to ensure that they were taking him seriously.

They all three gulped visibly and started to nod their heads emphatically, once they nodded he put on a little smile for them and said, "Good, now go get to your training, I want to see you all at your best when the time comes."

The three young gennin all plastered huge smiles on their face, gave Naruto a military salute and left to become stronger so they wouldn't let him down.

"So how do you think they'll go?" He asked of Anko who was standing behind a tree listening in to what they were saying.

"Well, if they take your advice they might do ok, if they don't they're going to get hurt." She said stepping out from behind the tree, "Do you really think that you could beat them in five seconds?" She asked in honest curiosity.

"Unfortunately I could defeat them in 1 second if I had the mind to." Anko saw that he said this with true sadness in his voice.

"Naruto, I wanted to thank you." Anko said trying to remove the sadness that had come over him.

"Thank me for what?" he asked truly confused.

"For walking me home last night."

"Oh, that, you're welcome," he smiled at her as he remembered something from last night, "you sure did get a few startled looks walking down the street with a white tiger by your side." She couldn't help it she just had to laugh as she also remembered the frightened people she walked past. Naruto loved Anko' laugh it reminded him of soft rain on a summer' day. When her laugh had subsided they began the training session for the day with a slow Kata style warm up with their blades drawn, and like the cats he had brought forth last night they too moved with grace and power, to look at them you would think that they had been friends their entire lives, and were now dancing together to the sound of battle that only they could hear. Anko was more then impressed with the progress Naruto had shown so far and she knew that she would have to start on the more advanced forms soon 'maybe after his birthday' she thought. Their training continued as usual for the next couple of days until the day of Naruto' birthday.

Naruto awoke on the day of his 18th birthday to shouts of anger coming from the streets below his apartment, he had put up with it every year, but this year he wasn't feeling very forgiving and decided he was going to confront them once and for all. He got out of bed wearing nothing but a pair of black boxers, went out to his balcony and jumped straight into the middle of the angry crowd and roared at them in a voice that was slathered in death "Shut up, people are trying to sleep you know?!" and they did indeed shut up, he could see that they were so afraid of him that a couple of them actually wet themselves. But after a while their anger overrode their fear and they started shouting, Naruto noticed that a man about 30 years of age was about to throw a rock at him, Naruto quickly turned to him and said in a calm deadly voice "Before you throw that you might want to bring the Hokage here, because she is the only one who's going to stop me from killing you." The man quickly stopped what he was about to do but before he could run for his life a new voice was heard coming from atop a roof across the street from Naruto' apartment, "Who said I was going to stop you Naruto? I might just help." Tsunade said looking down at the crowd as though she would like nothing better then to see them all dead. The crowd now truly fearing for their lives screamed in panic and dispersed as fast as they were able, when they had all gone Tsunade jumped down from the roof next to Naruto and hugged him as tightly as possible his entire body was shaking with unshed tears, but it was feeling her tears on his shoulder that calmed him down and he just hugged her back until her tears had stopped, and then said "Would you like some tea?" a little smile on his lips. Tsunade nodded her head against his shoulder, and while still hugging her he jumped back onto his balcony, where he let her go and lead her into the kitchen to prepare the tea for the two of them. After he had set a cup of tea down in front of Tsunade and sat down with one of his own he said to her softly, "I'm sorry about that Tsunade, I shouldn't have threatened them like that." Tsunade was more then appalled that Naruto thought that he had to apologize for what just happened she said taking one of his hands into one of her own, "Naruto, you have absolutely nothing to be sorry about, they're the ones that should be apologizing not you."

He merely gave her hand a little squeeze before saying with love and a catch in his voice, "I love you like you were my mother." At his words tears started to fall from Tsunade' eyes, but this time instead of tears of sorrow and anger, these were tears of love and joy and she answered with all the love she could muster, "And I love you like you were my own son, Naruto." And pulled him into a maternal hug that the two of them had wanted for such a long time, they were now a family and they would consider each other as such from now on. Naruto spent the time he was usually at the library with Tsunade, they just sat and talked about anything for hours until it was time for him to go to training, so with a hug that promised more to come and a whispered 'Happy birthday son' they said their goodbyes and Naruto was off to see what Anko had in store for him.

When Naruto arrived at the waterfall he was a little surprised to see that Anko was already waiting for him, he could see that from the way she was acting that she was nervous about something but decided to ignore it for now and asked, "So what are you going to teach me today Anko?" Hearing his voice seemed to have reduced her nervousness a little, and she smiled at him before responding, "Today's training will be harsh and demanding, today you are going to train to relax and enjoy yourself." Anko could see the confusion on his face and decided just to show him what she meant, she walked over to the river and started to take off her clothes until she was standing there in nothing but a black bikini, then running to the rivers edge she dove straight in. When she resurfaced she turned around to see Naruto completely stumped, he just wasn't sure if it had really happened or not, but then Anko called out to him "Are you coming swimming or not?" at her words he snapped out of his daze and started to slowly strip down to his boxers, out of the corner of his eye he could have sworn that he saw Anko lick her lips as he was pulling down his pants but merely shrugged it off and dived in after her. For five hours they had been playing and swimming in the water and just relaxing on the shore absorbing the suns warmth; and this is where they were when it was close coming to the time that the training session would end for the day. They were both lying on their stomachs on the towels that Anko had thought to bring along with her, Naruto was staring at the cursed seal that was on her neck when she turned her head towards him and smiled, then she started to scoot herself closer to him until her breast was pressed against his arm and she kissed him on the cheek and whispered "Happy birthday Naruto." To say that this brought a blush to his cheeks was an understatement, but Anko just giggled a little and went back to her own towel.

Meanwhile in the trees not 50 yards away from Naruto and Anko, a severely blushing Hinata fainted.

Five minutes later Naruto got up and offered Anko his hand to help her up, they then proceeded to get dressed for Naruto could feel the others arriving for the evening. Just as they picked up their swords Sakura and Tsunade walk into the clearing, Sakura quickly dropped everything and ran to Naruto to threw her arms around him and give him a kiss on the cheek with an exuberant 'Happy Birthday' and then she stepped back for Tsunade. Tsunade merely hugged him but when she did he said something that brought a tear to her eye, "Thank you Tsunade-Kaasan (mother)" the gasp from the other two women was ignored by Tsunade and Naruto as they held each others hands, they were interrupted however by the jubilant trio of Maru, Moegi, and Udon who all yelled out "Happy Birthday Boss." Before they swarmed him in a group hug. After that everyone else poured into the clearing, including Teuchi and Ayame who were of course catering, as they each approached him they gave their congratulations and a slap on the back from the guys and a hug and a kiss on the cheek from the girls, and also a hug from lee but no kiss. They had set up a fire with logs surrounding it for seating when Shikamaru asked "Where's Hinata?" almost everyone turned to Neji for an answer but before he could Naruto pointed into the trees and said, "She fainted." Naruto smiled a little at Anko to let her know why Hinata had fainted, and she just had to laugh she hadn't even known that Hinata was there watching them. Everyone was so sidetracked by Anko' laughter that no one got up to retrieve the unconscious girl, but then all of a sudden Naruto was up and walked over to Jaraiya and said "Ero-Sennin your camera quick." Holding out his hand for it, and upon receiving it disappeared into the trees when he returned he was chuckling to himself and looking at the picture he had just taken, then he looked at Neji and said, "Neji, can you bring Hinata over here it's starting to get cool." Neji merely nodded and walked off to pick his cousin off the ground and returned to the fire to see the others staring at the picture Naruto was showing them, and Naruto pronounced "Doesn't she look cute?!" The guys pretty much had greedy expressions plastered on their faces, but the girls looked at it adoringly. Once Neji had settled Hinata on the ground near the fire he looked up and saw Naruto looking at him with a smile on his face.

"What are you smiling at Naruto?" Neji asked wanting to know what was funny.

"Oh, nothing really, I just thought that it was amusing to see a Jounin following the order of a Gennin." Neji' eyebrow twitched as he realized that he had indeed done that, and the others just couldn't help the laughter that spilled from all of their mouths, but it was all the noise that had awoken Hinata and she was confused as to what was going on. When Naruto saw that she was up he walked over to her and helped her to her feet, once she was standing he showed her the picture, she almost fainted again but just blushed deeply, for in the picture she was curled up in a ball with her hair splayed around her and she was sucking on her thumb.

"Hey Naruto, how did you know she was like that before you got there?" Kiba asked.

"I had a bird watching her." Only four people there understood what he was talking about the rest looked at him completely clueless.

"Naruto why don't you just show them what you showed us the other night." Anko suggested.

Naruto shrugged his shoulders as if to say 'why not' but before he performed the jutsu he said, "Kakashi, why don't you see if you can copy this with your Sharingan?" then turned to Tsunada, "I know he's not at 100% yet but one test shouldn't hurt should it, Tsunade-Kaasan?" She tilted her head a little in thought and then nodded to Naruto before turning to Neji.

"See what you can see with those eyes of yours." She then turned back to Naruto to witness the event again. Naruto waited for the both of them to activate their eyes and then proceeded to do the jutsu and said "Ikimono-Supai Jutsu." And once again a white tiger and a black panther stood in font of him, he then made the panther walk over to Hinata and start rubbing its head against her chest until Hinata wrapped her arms around the panther' neck and it started to purr.

"Naruto, you stop that right now." Tsunade said with a chuckle in her voice.

"What? I didn't do anything I just wanted a hug is all." He said with a smile. He knew that the others had no idea what they were talking about and explained it to them just as he had to Tsunade, Anko and Sakura, when the realization came they all looked at the panther and remembered what it had done and everyone blushed. He then turned to Kakashi and asked with a knowing smile, "So, were you able to copy it?" Kakashi simply shook his head in bafflement, "What about you Neji, do they look like real animals."

"They look real to me." He replied also baffled.

"Good, I was wondering how they would look to you, although I'm sure that if I brought them forth for battle you would know the difference," seeing a look of confusion on Neji' face he continued, "you see if I was going to use them in battle I would have charged them with a fair amount of chakra so that they would be more effective." Neji just nodded his head in understanding.

"Foods ready." Teuchi announced.

After they got their food, they all returned to the fire and sat on the logs to eat, except for Naruto who was actually sitting on the ground leaning his back against the white tiger' stomach, when Anko saw where he was going to sit she had quickly made her way over to him and sat down next to him leaning her back against the tiger' chest, the others were too slow to the panther that was lying next to them for Sakura and Hinata were already there. As Naruto was about to take another bite he noticed Ayame, "Ayame, I wouldn't sit there if I was you, it might be safer to sit next to Kakashi." He told her because she was about to sit next to Jaraiya, almost everyone laughed, except that Jaraiya looked disappointed and Kakashi looked like he was blushing. And she did indeed sit next to Kakashi with a blush of her own, the meal was delicious of course, and the conversation quiet as people were only talking to those they sat next to. The jealousy that was coming off Hinata and Sakura was obvious to all, as they watched Anko leaning in to whisper something in his ear which brought a smile to his face. Once the meal was over Jaraiya suddenly stood up and yelled "Presents." Which made Naruto blush at the attention, it appeared as though each team had gotten him something; from Kurunai' team he got a book on advance Taijutsu, from Gai' team he got a new set of kunai, from Asuma' team he got a pair of trench knives, from team Kakashi including Yamato and Sai he got Jounin level gloves saying that 'even though he did not have the rank he at least had the skills', and then came Maru' group they came up to him and smiled brightly and gave him their present, "We promise to protect those important to us at all costs." They chorused together, he was so happy at the present that he gave them a group hug. Tsunade was about to stand up but he stopped her before she could do anything by saying, "You gave me everything I could possibly need from you this morning Tsunade-Kaasan." After he said this silent tears were running down her cheeks so he stood up and hugged her like he had done this morning. Once the hug had finished he went back to his seat next to Anko and whispered in her ear, "You too have given me enough." This made her blush, from the feeling of his breath on her neck. Then Jaraiya got up, the last to do so, "Naruto my gift is simple, the truth, the truth of who your parents were." When he was about to continue Naruto interrupted him, "My mothers name was Kushina Uzumaki, wife of Minato Namikaze the Forth Hokage and also my father." All of them looked at him shocked, most because of what he had just revealed, and some at the fact that he already knew, he looked at Jaraiya and continued, "I must have bugged you every night we were away for stories about the Forth and like I said to Anko 'When you put enough pieces together the picture soon becomes clear'"

"How long have you known?" Jaraiya asked in a shaky voice.

"About a year before we got back." He replied solemnly.

"Why didn't you say anything?"

"I figured you would tell me when you thought the time was right, besides I knew the reason why you didn't tell me earlier was to keep me safe from my father' enemies, and I already had enough of those to worry about. I would appreciate it if this information could be kept between us. I trust all of you with my life." Naruto felt Anko grab his arm and lean her head against his shoulder when Kiba shouted.

"You're the Forth' son."

"Yep." With that rather succinct answer, all of the younger people present started talking all at once. When he had answered them all as best as he could he turned to Tsunade.

"I have heard many stories about my father from Jaraiya I was hoping that you could tell me more about my mother Tsunade-Kaasan." There was such longing in his eyes that all she could do was to go to him hug him and say over and over again "Of course I will."

After that the party wound down with people just gazing at the fire in front of them or the stars above, soon enough people started to disperse in groups of two or three until the only ones remaining were Naruto and Anko who had fallen asleep on his shoulder, and so picking her up bridal style he carried her home with her snuggling into his chest.


	6. Chapter 6

Because You Love Me.

Part 6: Release

It was the morning after Naruto' birthday and there were 10 days until the end of the second test in the Chunnin Exam and the start of the possible preliminary matches. A blonde haired ninja with a sword strapped to his back was waiting outside of the library, when he would normally be found inside reading he was waiting for someone he was waiting for Hinata. He wanted to do something with her instead of the usual silent companionship that they had been sharing lately, when he saw her approaching the library he pushed off from the wall he was leaning on and walked over to intercept her, "Hina, would you like to go for a walk with me today?" Naruto asked already knowing the answer but thought it polite to ask anyway. When he received the nod he took her hand in his and interlaced their fingers and walked away from the library, he didn't really know where they were going he just wanted to get there together, and so they wandered aimlessly talking about the party last night and little trivial matters when Naruto stopped walking and turned Hinata to face him. For although he had a strong desire to kiss her he had stopped to ask her a serious question, "Hina, do you actually want to be the head of your clan, and don't just give me the answer that you've been conditioned to give, I want a real answer?" He said staring down into her lavender eyes.

For a moment she had completely forgotten what Naruto had asked for she was lost in his eyes, but when she came back to herself she really thought about it, and she also thought about the fact that Naruto was the first person to actually even ask her what she wanted to do with her life. And without a stutter whatsoever, she had gotten over that just by spending quiet time with him, she answered "Even though it would be a great honor, I'm just not sure, and even if I did I wouldn't become head for a very long time, and until that possibility even arrives I think that I would enjoy teaching at the academy." At the end of her speech her eyes had drifted to her feet in embarrassment and a little bit of shame.

Placing his finger under her chin and raising her head so that she would look him in the eye he said, "So why don't you? There is nothing wrong with doing what you have to do in order to be happy, and absolutely no need to feel embarrassed or ashamed of wanting to do something that would benefit the village." Unable to hold back any more he leaned in and softly kissed her lips, it was short but sweet, and when he pulled away he had a mischievous smirk, that was quickly becoming his replacement for his well known foxy grin. And so taking her hand once more they started walking with Hinata smiling up at him as she hugged his arm and then he said, "If you like I can talk to Tsunade-Kaasan for you?" She pulled a little away from his shoulder to tilt her head in an inquiring manner then asked, "Why do you call Tsunade-Sama 'Kaasan' now Naruto?"

Naruto looked down at her to answer and thought that she looked so beautiful looking at him like that and replied, "We came to an understanding, if we were going to love each other as mother and son we might as well address each other as such. So would you like me to talk to her?"

"Yes please, thank you Naruto."

"It's no problem at all Hina, but I'm going to have to see her after training, speaking of which I should be going." Naruto said as he had just noticed that the time had gone by in an instant, and with that said he stopped them again and turned to face her and pressed his lips against hers before whispering in her ear, "I'll see you in the morning." And he felt her give a slight shiver as his breath caressed her skin, and left one beauty for another.

When Naruto arrived at the waterfall he saw Anko taking her coat off, revealing her shapely form, and releasing her hair so that it fell down her back. Naruto had never seen Anko with her hair down it was longer then he imagined it swayed to just below her shoulder blades. Walking up to her he was more then tempted to run his fingers through her hair, but barely managed to keep himself under control, "Good morning, Anko." He greeted marveling at her body, "Good morning, Naruto. Um… how did I get home last night?" Anko asked feeling slightly embarrassed.

"Well after the others had left I carried you home, found your keys and took you inside where I took off your shoes and coat and then I put you to bed." Then I kissed you goodnight, he thought to himself.

"Oh good I was hoping it was you… um I mean I was hoping it wasn't Jaraiya or Kakashi." She amended quickly quite flustered.

All Naruto could do was smile at her a little and change the subject for her, "So what's on the agenda for today?" As he asked his eyes traveled down her body and back up again.

"Advanced training, so take off you jacket and draw your blade, but leave the scabbard behind." And so complying he first removed the sword from his back and handed it to Anko to hold while he stripped off his jacket, once he removed it and thrown it on top of Anko coat he held out his hand for his sword, but Anko wasn't moving she was frozen in desire. Naruto wasn't wearing his normal black t-shirt, he was in fact wearing a skin tight black sleeveless top, and Anko was near to drooling over the way he looked in it, and although Naruto loved the reaction he got he still wanted to train so he called her name repeatedly until she once again focused on all of him and not just his body, and handed him his sword and picked up her own.

"You have grasped the basics while standing on the river, now lets see how you do under the pressure of the waterfall." With that said she led him in under the heavy flow of water, and began the days training.

They had been under the waterfall for three straight hours when Anko finally called for a break, and walked onto the shore and threw on her coat, she noticed that Naruto simply went over to a tree leaned his sword against the bough and sat down leaning against the rough bark of the tree with his legs at an angle so that he could rest his arms on his knees, then closing his eyes he tilted his head back to rest against the tree. After a couple of minutes Naruto hears Anko approaching him, but he keeps his eyes closed, when she reached him she stands between his knees and looks down at him awed by everything he does, when he says suddenly yet quietly, "Well are you going to sit down, I know your at least a little tired?" After a moment of thought she slowly turns around and lowers herself to the ground where she stood and pressed her back into his chest. Closing her eyes she leans her head back to rest on his shoulder, breathing deeply she could feel his heart beating against her back and she noticed that it was slow and steady. After about 15 minutes of sitting like this Anko felt Naruto move his head down and wondered what he was doing when she felt him slide her coat off her left shoulder, moving his mouth to her ear he whispers "Do you mind if I take a look at your cursed seal?" She felt his lips brush against her ear which sent a shiver through her body and she took a sharp gasp of breath before answering in all honesty, "Do as you wish."

Placing his hand over the cursed seal he started to pulse small amounts of chakra in and out of his hand, this is something that Jaraiya had taught him to detect poisons and drugs in his food and drinks, after a while of this he noticed that Anko' breathing had quickened and she had dug her fingers into his legs, knowing what was happening he didn't stop, even though he had all the information he was going to get, he kept at it until her built up _tension_ was quietly released.

Once her breathing had returned to normal she asked, "So what did you find out?"

"Let me think on it for a while." And with that he wrapped his arms around her shoulders and drew her more firmly against his chest. After 10 minutes of thinking the problem through, and absentmindedly stroking her shoulder, he asked "Would you like to be rid of that cursed seal?" She couldn't believe what she had just heard; even Tsunade had no way of removing the cursed seal that Orochimaru had inflicted upon her.

"Do you really think you can do it?" She asked with great anticipation.

"I'm about 97% certain that I can remove it, 100% certain that it's going to hurt like hell, and there's about a 35% chance of you dieing. But I should be able to reduce that if Tsunade-Kaasan is there to help out afterwards." When she heard what he had to say she started to cry, hugging his arms that were wrapped around her still. "I will talk to Tsunade-Kaasan after training today then we'll go from there, ok?" For the next half hour Naruto just held her until she had control of her emotions again, before they continued with the rest of their training.

Walking into Tsunade' office without knocking Naruto walked up to the desk and said, "Tsunade-Kaasan I need to talk to you about a couple of things."

Looking up from her paperwork at the sound of his voice a smile spread across her face and she greeted him by saying, "Naruto-Segare (my son), what would you like to talk about?"

"May I?" he asked motioning to the chair in front of her desk, upon receiving permission he sat down and continued, "First I have a request to make on behalf of Hinata."

"And what would this request be, Naruto?" She asked smiling, thinking she knew what this was about, but she was way off.

"She wishes to teach at the academy."

"What about her duties as a Kunoichi?" Tsunade asked.

"You know as well as I, that the teachers at the academy are more then just teachers, they are also responsible for the welfare of its students in times of emergency." Naruto responded with a completely calm demeanor.

"Your point is taken, but what about her duties to her clan then?"

"Her duty is to the village first, she second, and her clan last. Although I know that the clans do not think that way, that it how it is written in the clan legislation 'Without the Village the Individual is nothing, Without the Individual the Clan is less then nothing' and so the clan cannot deny her in this." The eloquence of his words moved her in ways that she had not been moved since before the Forth died.

"You are right of course, can you have Hinata come and see me tomorrow at noon?"

"Of course Tsunade-Kaasan, and now onto my second bit of business, I would like your assistance when I release Anko of the cursed seal that she has been burdened with for far too long." Naruto' voice was laced with such sympathy when he talked about Anko, that Tsunade couldn't help but notice the sadness in his eyes. Then what he had said registered in her mind.

"You mean to tell me that you can remove the cursed seal without killer Anko?" She almost shouted, but still her voice was fairly loud.

"With you there for her recovery once it is done, her chances of dieing are about 9%, but without you there it's about 35%, and just so you know Anko wants me to do this with or without you, I would just prefer to do it with you there, because she is going to be in a lot of pain during and after the seal is broken. So what do you say you will you help?"

"Of course I'll help, I'll put a team together and we can do it in two days time."

"No team, just you and me will be there." Naruto said, clearly not going to be moved on this point.

"No team, why not?" Tsunade asked wanting to know the reason for this turn of events.

"I will be using so much chakra in there that it's entirely possible that I could inadvertently burn away other people's chakra systems, and I can only shield one person at a time which is why only you will be there."

"But what about Anko then, couldn't you also burn away her chakra system as well?"

"To an extent that's the plan," at this Tsunade gasped in shock, "From what I can tell the cursed seal is nothing more then a chakra virus that the body cannot burn off, so that's what I'm going to do I'm going to flood her system with so much chakra that the virus can no longer survive, and the moment that it is destroyed I need to quickly absorb my chakra back into me before it destroys her chakra pathways."

"I could do that there is no need for you to do this." But as she said it Naruto was shaking his head in disagreement.

"I'm talking about a _lot_ of chakra Tsunade-Kaasan."

"How much is a lot."

"About 95% of _my_ chakra and I have at least twice as much as you Tsunade-Kaasan, and doing it as a group is just plain irresponsible."

"But that much chakra will kill Anko immediately." She said shocked.

"If I inserted it in all at once absolutely, but I'm going to do it very slowly it will take about 3-4 hours for me to get to the point where the virus is dead, but it will be the last 10 minutes that are going to be the most painful for Anko." Knowing that he was going to cause Anko pain hurt him inside. "So we will do it in 2 days, make sure to have a room ready with a _very_ strong chakra barrier around it." Tsunade nodded her head indicating that all would be as he said; "Now if you will I would like to hear about my mother, if you have some time to spare." For the remainder of the day they talked about his mother, and had dinner together.

The following morning Naruto could once again be found outside the library waiting for Hinata, when she arrived Naruto quickly took her hand in his kissed her lips softly and started walking away from the library, "Tsunade-Kaasan is expecting you in her office at noon, and there is no reason to be nervous." Naruto added as he looked down at her to see her fidgeting. "Why are you doing all this for me Naruto?" Hinata asked.

"Because you love me." Was Naruto' only answer.

The day past, beauty after beauty after beauty, and his night was spent in remembrance of all three. The following morning was also the same as before a hand, lips, and a walk, but then the time came to hurt someone he cared deeply for. Entering the hospital with Anko at his side he was greeted by Sakura, "Tsunade-Sama has asked me to lead you to the operation room." And so saying she led them deep into the hospital, Anko was so nervous about what was going to happen that she clung to Naruto' arm as if she would never let go, taking her hand in his he interlaced their fingers and giving a little squeeze of reassurance and whispered, "Promise me you won't leave me, promise me you won't die, promise me you'll live." He said it with such conviction that any promise she made he was going to hold her to it forever, "I promise." She whispered back blushing slightly. Just then Sakura turned around to face them arriving at the operating room, without saying anything she opened the door and preceded them inside. Upon entering the room Naruto looked around in anger, there were six other med-nin' in attendance and it looked like they were planning on staying, "Get them out of here NOW, Tsunade-Kaasan." He said coldly with anger lacing every word. Tsunade shook her head and looked at Sakura, "I told you not to go against his orders Sakura, what were you thinking?" Sakura took a step back from both of them before answering in a quivering voice, "It's too dangerous to do something like this without a full med team."

"If you want yourself and the other six to die then by all means stay, but I would prefer to only cause one person horrendous pain today." He said his anger now turned to utter sadness.

"Die? But Tsunade-Sama will be there with you."

"And I'll be shielding her from harm, now please Sakura take your team out of here." When Naruto looked at her Sakura knew the reason he was angry before it was because he didn't want any of them to be hurt or worse die, especially her. She nodded her head in understanding and signaled for the others to leave the room as well, before she left the room she stroked his arm and that one gesture conveyed so many things be safe, good luck, come back to me, I love you, and then she was out the door locking it behind her.

"Is the room ready, Tsunade-Kaasan?" He asked more then a little nervous.

"As ready as it will ever be, Naruto-Segare." As Naruto looked around the room he saw that the entire walls and ceiling were covered with protection symbols and on the floor were 5 concentric protection rings and in the middle of those rings were two chairs. Agreeing that everything seemed to be in readiness he led Anko over to one of the chairs pulled her coat off for her and had her sit down. "Tsunade-Kaasan please take the other chair, we're going to be here for a while." When Naruto said this Tsunade looked shocked.

"But I thought that I would be standing out side of the rings."

"The only safe place in this room will be if you are touching me, everything else will be destroyed except for the floor, walls and ceiling, even the light hanging down above us will be gone by the time I'm finished, so if you will." Tsunade could be seen swallowing deeply, and a little fear could be seen in her eyes, "Don't worry Tsunade-Kaasan, just don't let go even for a second." She walked over and sat down in the second chair that was positioned behind and to the left of the one Anko occupied, and gripping Naruto' forearm he said, "Let's begin then." He placed his left hand on the cursed seal and the right on the other side of her neck, and then slowly begin to pump chakra into Anko' body.

Tsunade could almost see the shield that Naruto had placed around her and the chair, she also felt as though there was one on the chair Anko sat in but she couldn't be sure, for the amount of chakra Naruto was using was almost blinding and he had only been going for 30 minutes.

An hour and a half into the procedure and Sakura and her team could feel Naruto' enormous chakra from out in the hall.

Two and half hours in and it could be felt outside the hospital.

Three hours in Sakura could hear tortured screaming coming from behind the door to the operating room and Naruto' chakra could be felt throughout the village, and the entire Konoha Eleven ran to the hospital to find out what was going on.

Ten minutes later Naruto was trying to retrieve as much of his chakra as possible and then he passed out. Tsunade following Naruto' orders called in Sakura and her team while she immediately went to work on Anko, making sure that she hadn't drowned in the flood of chakra, when Tsunade looked at Anko' neck she saw no sign of the cursed seal and once she had examined Anko with her medic skills she found no trace whatsoever of the chakra virus, and evaluated that Anko was going to be fine in a few days. Upon realizing this she yelled out, "He did it, it worked the seal is broken." But when she looked over at Naruto, her heart almost froze he wasn't moving and Sakura was crying over him, Tsunade rushed over to her son and started to work on him as fast as she could, when suddenly one of Sakura' tears fell on his eye he twitched and groaned, "Is it raining?" so softly that they barely even heard it. Tsunade and Sakura both wrapped their arms around him so tight that they heard him give a protest of pain before slipping into a deep restful slumber.

When Naruto awoke he could hear people talking in hushed tones, "What happened Sakura, what did Naruto do?" Naruto was fairly sure that the voice belonged to Shikamaru.

"I'm not entirely sure, Tsunade wouldn't tell me the details, but she said that Naruto had lied to her, he had told her that there was a 35% chance of Anko dieing, but what he didn't tell her was that there was a 65% chance of him dieing. But apparently it all worked out Anko no longer has the cursed seal and they are both on their way to full recovery."

"It worked then, I'm glad." Naruto said through numb lips.

"Naruto, are you awake?" Turning his head to the side and opening his eyes he saw Anko lying in a bed next to him.

"Morning Anko, how are you feeling?" He said still a little drowsy.

"Free." Was her response, "And how are you?"

"Me? I'm fine just a little tired, I think I should go home and get some sleep." He mumbled. Everyone just smiled at him until he was fully asleep and then Sakura ushered everyone out of the room so the two patients could get some sleep. When everyone was gone Anko looked over to Naruto and said, "You set me free, now I give you my heart."


	7. Chapter 7

Because You Love Me.

Part 7: Encounters

The morning after the seal was broken Naruto found himself lying in a bed in the hospital, with Anko lying in the bed next to him, she was sleeping soundly every now and then he thought he heard her give a little purr, and when ever she did a smile graced his face, he loved watching her sleep she looked so peaceful. As he was staring at Anko her eyes slowly opened and stared right back at him and a little playful smile lit upon her lips and then she said quietly, "Good morning, did you sleep well?"

"Well enough considering what I did yesterday, and what about you how did you sleep?" Anko ignored the question and merely stayed focused on what he had said first, "What do you mean 'considering what you did yesterday' you saved me from a life time of pain is what you did?" She said a little angrily.

"Maybe, but it was _me_ that caused you horrendous pain yesterday, I just hope you can forgive me." The way Naruto said this it sounded as though he held out no hope, whatsoever as to ever to be forgiven. Anko threw her sheets off and walked over to Naruto' bed and laid down next to him wrapping her arms around his torso she whispered to him, "You are forgiven now and forever for doing what you had to do to set me free." At her words of forgiveness Naruto silently sheds tears of happiness. They stayed like that for the rest of the morning just talking, when lunch time came around Tsunade showed up to check on Naruto and to release Anko, upon entering the room Tsunade saw the position the two are in and just shrugs it off, she had to agree with Jaraiya that Naruto was just like his father when it came to women and she wondered how many had fallen in love with him, before entering the room she would have said two but now it appeared as though it was in fact three at least. Walking to the foot of Naruto' bed she looked down at the two and sees that Anko was blushing but Naruto looked as though this was completely normal and wasn't embarrassed at all, in fact he looked like he was enjoying himself which made Tsunade smile, "Anko I just need to give you a quick check up and then you can go home." Anko looked fairly disappointed that she wouldn't be staying in hospital anymore. After Anko' examination she gave Naruto a kiss on the cheek and then left with a small wave goodbye and a promise to visit tomorrow. After Anko had left Tsunade began to give Naruto a check up but was interrupted by Hinata coming into the room and taking his hand in hers she kissed him and then blushed profusely when she finally noticed that Naruto was not alone, but she still retained his hand and interlaced their fingers. Tsunade just ignored the two of them and just continued her exam trying desperately to smother the giggle that wanted to come out at Naruto' antics. After Tsunade had finished she said, "You can probably go home tomorrow Naruto, but I'll have to give you another check before you leave though, so I'll see you then." And with a wink at Naruto she left the two young ninja alone. "Naruto, thank you so much, Tsunade said I can start at the academy next week, isn't that wonderful?" Hinata said looking at Naruto with so much love he didn't think there was that much love in the entire world.

"That's excellent Hinata, but I guess it's going to put a stop to our morning encounters, maybe I will have to take a page out of your book Hinata." Referring of course to Hinata' predilection of spying on him. Hinata could only blush at his statement and after a while she got up kissed him fully on the lips and said, "Sorry Naruto, but I have to go meet Iruka-Sensei he said that he would take me through all that it means to be a teacher."

"Ok then, say hi to Iruka for me ok?" She kissed him again and with a nod she left Naruto alone to rest and recuperate.

Later that day Sakura came to take Naruto to his physical therapy session, helping him get out of his bed and then having him lean on her as they made their way down the hall to the hospital' exercise room, Naruto had an arm draped around Sakura' shoulders and when he suddenly stumbled he had accidentally pinned her up against the wall with his arms trapping her preventing her escape, breathing a little heavily he looked up into her eyes that were mere inches from his own, and then he felt her hands on his stomach and slowly ascending over his highly toned abs and chest when her hands reached his neck she moved then around the back so that she could pull him into the kiss she had dreamed about for oh so long, but before she did her fingers started to play with the soft hair at the base of his neck which made his entire body tingle at the sensation, and then she slowly oh so slowly pulled his lips closer to her own. When their lips finally met her self control evaporated and she lost herself in the feel of his body pressed against hers and the softness of his lips, and then nothing she had fainted she had stopped breathing as soon as their lips met. Naruto quickly held her up so that she wouldn't fall to the floor, and then carrying her bridal style he went back to his room and laid her down onto the bed that Anko had occupied that very morning. After Sakura had recovered from her little spell they got around to the physical therapy and the day past without further excitement.

The following morning Naruto was feeling almost back to normal and was more then ready to continue his training, but he knew that he had to wait for Tsunade' permission before he could leave, after lunch Anko arrived just as she promised she would, she immediately lied down on the bed with him resting her head on his shoulder and then asked quietly, "Why did you do it Naruto, you could have died?"

"It was worth the risk."

"But why, why was it worth it?" Anko asked pleadingly.

"I care about you Anko, you are important to me." Naruto could feel her crying on his shoulder and simply pulled her into a tight embrace before continuing, "I would gladly give up my life for yours." Naruto just held her wishing he could tell her more but the words wouldn't come.

When Tsunade arrived to discharge Naruto Anko was still quietly crying into his shoulder, and although she gave Naruto a questioning look he merely motioned for her to precede with the exam, after giving a quick check she said "Well Naruto I think you can go home today, and return to training tomorrow after all you have to fight in the preliminary matches in 3 days time." He simply gave her a nod and continued to hold Anko, after Tsunade had left them alone Naruto said, "Do you think you could give me a hand getting home Anko, I don't know how steady on my feet I am at the moment?" At her nod she got off the bed and sat down in the chair to wait for him to be ready, Anko didn't leave the room as Naruto got dressed she watched, out of concern of course, once he was dressed he motioned for Anko to come to him and then threw an arm around her shoulder and she wrapped one around his waist, and then they proceeded out the hospital and down the streets of Konoha to Naruto' apartment.

Upon reaching his apartment Naruto said that he was going to take a shower and asked if Anko would mind, no not joining him, running to Ichiruka' for some ramen for the both of them, she of course agreed to go get them dinner and ran out to get the food while Naruto showered. When Anko arrived back with the food she sees Naruto sitting on the couch in nothing but his black pajama pants, hair still slightly damp and a little steam rising from his exposed skin. After the meal Naruto gets up from the couch to clean away the dishes but starts to collapse onto the coffee table, but Anko was quick to react and caught him before he fell and then helped him limp into his bed room and gently lowering him down onto the soft mattress. Just before he fell asleep Naruto took hold of Anko' hand and gave it a little squeeze as if to say 'stay' so she removed her coat and shoes and laid down next to Naruto, once she had snuggled into his chest Naruto draped an arm over Anko and she interlaced his fingers with hers, and then they both fell into a contented sleep.

When Naruto awoke the next morning with Anko sleeping in his arms he felt something that he had not felt ever he felt happy, happy to be alive, happy with who he was, but mostly he was happy with whom he was with. Gently releasing his hold on Anko, Naruto got up and headed for the kitchen to make some coffee and cook breakfast for the both of them. Although she was awake Anko stayed in bed, she could hear Naruto cooking and was fairly certain that he would bring it into her, and she wasn't disappointed he did indeed bring her breakfast in bed. Once he handed the breakfast tray to Anko he sat himself down on the bed sitting up leaning against the wall with a pillow cushioning his back, and taking the tray back from Anko she did likewise and snuggled in close to him with her head resting on his shoulder, eating the food by picking at it with their fingers they quickly devoured it after eating Anko said that she was going to take a shower, and almost invited Naruto to join her but resisted the urge. Once Anko finished her shower she stepped into the living room wearing nothing but a towel, she had no clean clothes to wear, "Do you have anything I could wear Naruto?" She asked blushing.

For a few minutes Naruto couldn't think, he just stood there staring at her, Anko had to repeat her question twice more before she finally got a reaction from him, "Yes, just a second." He went into his bedroom and grabbed a pair of black pants and one of his sleeveless tops and brought them out to her, "Here put these on I'll fix the size after your changed." In his head the one thought kept repeating itself over and over again 'Please stay here to change' but his silent pleas went unanswered for Anko returned to his bedroom to change although she only closed the door halfway, Naruto was severely tempted to watch but crushed the thought and just cleaned the dishes from dinner last night and breakfast this morning. When Anko returned to the living room Naruto couldn't help but laugh a little, his clothes were way to big for her, he walked up to Anko and without saying anything formed the seals for the Clothes Reduction Jutsu and held fast to the waist band of the pants and started shrinking them to the point where they were tight yet comfortably so, even after he had finished he left his hands where they were and moving his right index finger he started to caress the bare skin beneath the pants. His eyes were locked onto where his hands were and then slowly removing them he grabbed a handful of the shirts hem and started to reduce that also, as he did so he raised the hem line of the top so that it was now a midriff top, he fitted it perfectly to her body and to him she looked sexy as hell, again when he finished the Jutsu his hands remained flat on her well toned feminine stomach and then he slowly moved his fingers under the fabric and asked in a breathless voice, "It's not too tight is it?" Finally looking at her face he saw that her eyes were closed enjoying the sensation of his hands on her.

"No it's perfect." Anko answered with lust in her voice. She placed her hands on top of his and was about to guide them up higher when he said, "We should get to training." Even though he really didn't want to he took his hands off her and stepped away from her and picked up their swords where they were resting on his dresser, and so getting ready himself they quickly left his apartment before all thoughts were gone and only the physical remained.


	8. Chapter 8

Because You Love Me.

Part 8: Butterflies.

The day of the preliminaries has arrived and we find Naruto and Anko waiting for the time limit to expire in the waiting room that was occupied with Neji and other Jounin' including Temari who had returned after making sure that her village was secure and that her brother Gaara was doing well when she said, "I want to thank you Naruto and you too Neji for coming to help my brother, so thank you." Even though she said it in a sincere tone there was still her usual mocking smile on her lips. Neji just nodded his head in appreciation of the gratitude but Naruto couldn't help but give her a little dig, "So you and Shikamaru are dating huh?!"

"Why would I want to go out with that lazy git?"

"But you have kissed him haven't you?!" Naruto replied, enjoying the fact that this comment made Temari blush, Neji and Anko were looking over at Temari and Anko started to laugh, Neji just smiled a little even though he was laughing his ass off inside his head, and Naruto was just proud that he had guessed right.

"At least I've kissed someone _gennin_." Temari shot back, which only made Naruto chuckle a little.

"You do know that I trained with the Legendary Pervert for over two years, you don't think he only taught me how to fight do you?" He said completely seriously. The other three just looked at him wondering what else he might have been taught by that pervert.

"What do you mean by that Naruto?" Anko asked in absolute curiosity.

"Well… first he just taught me how to talk to girls, then how to gently flirt, and then how to pick them up, after that I guess it was the girls that taught me stuff." He replied with a smile remembering it all.

"And what exactly did these _girls _teach you?" Anko asked with a little fire in her eyes.

"Oh just this and that." Naruto said nonchalantly.

"Give us an example." Temari said.

"An example huh? Let me think… oh I know." Naruto walked over to Temari and took one of her hands in his and grabbed her wrist with his free hand and looked deep into her eyes, and that's all he did, but the feeling that Temari was experiencing and the flush that the other two could see made them believe that he was doing something else, after a minute Naruto let go and walked back to sit next to Anko.

"What did you just do?" Neji asked clearly impressed.

"What that? That was nothing, I just gave her the impression that she was the most beautiful woman in the world and that I would do absolutely anything for her, but doing that to someone you don't actually care about is dangerous." Naruto said with a slight shiver.

"What do you mean dangerous." Neji asked.

"Well, look at Temari practically the moment I let go of her she realized it was all a lie, which is why it's dangerous, the only reason I did it to Temari at all was because she knew it was a demonstration and I felt fairly confident that she wasn't going to kill me for lying to her." The other two did actually look at Temari to see if this was true, and she gave them both a slight nod to indicate that it was, "And lying to a woman about something like that is never wise, which is why I never use something like that on my friends." Naruto said giving Anko a meaningful glance.

"So what was it like Temari?" Anko asked.

"Intense," Temari answered breathing a little heavily still, "But as soon as he let me go I did indeed know it was a lie," looking at Naruto she continued, "Whoever you end up with will be extremely lucky."

"Your wrong Temari," at his words Temari looked completely shocked, but when he continued her face calm in realization, "It will be I who will be the lucky one to end up with someone I can love so much that I can look at them like that and not have it be a lie."

"I can only hope that you do find someone that you can love like that." Temari replied.

"So how many girls have you kissed in the village Naruto?" Neji asked.

"Just two and one of them fainted," He answered with a little smile at Neji, "Hinata didn't faint." Neji gave a little sigh at first thinking that Naruto hadn't kissed his cousin but then his words finally made sense.

"You kissed Hinata?" Neji said almost yelling.

"A few times," Naruto answered calmly, "She is quite attractive you know Neji?!"

"You had better not break her heart Naruto or you'll be the one broken." Neji said as threateningly as possible.

"I can not promise that, I'm sorry Neji." Naruto said a little sadly. At his words Neji rushed Naruto preparing to punch him in the face, but before he got within arms length he found Anko' sword blade at his throat.

"He can not promise that because we are ninja and he may die in battle, and also I don't think he even knows his own heart at the moment," Anko said, and then looking at Naruto with sad eyes she asked, "Who else are you confused about Naruto?"

Having not made a move to defend himself from Neji' attack Naruto looked at Neji with a look that said he deserved to receive any pain Neji could give him and then answered, "There are two others I'm confused about, two I know love me and the other I'm not sure how she feels exactly."

"And how do you feel about these women Naruto?" Temari asked from behind Neji who was slowly backing away from Naruto, Neji really didn't like the look on Naruto' face at the moment and regretted rushing him.

"I know that I would risk everything for them, I know that I care for them all deeply, and I know that I don't deserve any of them." At the last statement Anko cringed. "Neji, I would appreciate it if you could tell Hinata all that you've heard here today, and I will tell Sakura they both deserve to know where they stand."

"What about the third woman?" Temari asked.

"She already knows." Was Naruto' simple answer glancing at Anko. Looking back at Neji he awaited his reply.

"Yes Naruto I will tell Hinata, I will try to tell her as gently as possible." With Naruto' nod of appreciation they all sat in silence for a while before making small talk to await the matches.

Walking into the hall where the preliminary matches were about to start Naruto noticed that 5 teams had made it through bringing the total number of fighters to 16 including him, he was immensely proud to see that Maru' team had actually made it through, although they did look a little worse for wear, Naruto also saw that two Sand teams were also through, the other two teams were from Rain and Rock. As Naruto was about to walk down to stand next to the teams Anko grabbed his hand to keep him standing up on the platform with her and when he conceded to her will she didn't release his hand she merely entwined their finger and gave his hand a little squeeze. Soon after Tsunade explained the meaning of the Chunnin Exam and what was going to happen now and then everyone moved up to the balconies to watch the first fight, Naruto and Anko moved over to where Temari was standing with the Sand Gennin followed by Maru' and his team, "So Temari, were any of these trained by Gaara?" Naruto asked as they approached.

Before she could answer one of the Gennin berated Naruto by saying, "Hey, don't call him that he's the Kazekage show some respect." Temari slapped the back of the head of the young Kunoichi and said, "It's you that needs to show some respect, don't you know who this is?" At the confused and slightly frightened look of the girl she said, "This is Uzumaki Naruto." Upon hearing Naruto' name the girl started to stutter.

"Y-Your U-Uzumaki N-N-Naruto?"

"Heard of me have you?" Naruto asked with a smile playing along his lips.

All the Sand Gennin nodded their heads looking up at him and then the girl who had first berated him said, "You saved Kazekage-sama, and I heard that you even beat him in a fight once."

"I merely helped to save him it was a team effort, and the fight ended in a draw." Naruto said not looking embarrassed at all.

"No Naruto your wrong there that was not the first time you saved him, the first time was when you fought and he realized what true strength was," Temari said and then continued in a softer tone, "After that fight Gaara changed, and for that I will always be grateful to you." And to the shock of them all she hugged him.

Brushing away the somber mood Naruto repeated his first question, "So, were any of them trained by Gaara?" After that Naruto stayed with the Sand ninja' and talked to them while watching the fights and bring the others that were with him into the conversation as well. Naruto watched as Maru defeated a Rain nin, and then Moegi beat one of the Rock nin, but Udon was defeated by one of the Sand, Naruto was the last to fight and when his name was displayed on the board the Sand Gennin were shocked to realize that he was still a Gennin and that he was fighting, the ones that had made it through were also hoping that they wouldn't have to fight him in the finals. Naruto was matched up against a Kunoichi from Rain, before heading down to the arena he removed his sword and handed it to Anko and said, "Hold this for me for a minute please, this shouldn't take long." And with that said he jumped over the railing and landed without making any noise whatsoever.

"You should have kept your sword boy, your going to need it." His opponent jeered. Naruto didn't say anything and just stood there looking at her with cold calculating eyes, when the match was called to start the Kunoichi charged at Naruto with a kunai in hand, Naruto stood his ground, when the woman was almost with arms reach he ducked under her arm and brought his forearm up and smashed it into her neck just under her jaw and then gave a chakra powered shove and pushed her back slamming her into the opposite wall were she fell unconscious and then he said, "That's why I removed my sword, if I had kept it you wouldn't have kept your head." Picturing the move he had just executed with his sword in his hand holding it with a reverse grip he could have indeed taken her head off. The entire audience, except Anko, was completely shocked that he had just won in less then 5 seconds and also that he could have done what he said he could do. After hearing the confirmation that he had won he jumped backwards without looking to land right next to Anko who handed him his sword, "You took too long." She said playfully.

"I wanted them to be actually able to see it and if I had done it at full speed I would have snapped her neck and I only needed to win not kill her." Naruto said in all honesty.

With the final match done there were three Konoha Nin advancing to the finals, three Sand and two Rock were also advancing. After drawing lots to see who was fighting who in the finals Naruto found that he was matched up with Moegi, and she looked completely scared that she was going to have to fight Naruto after she had just seen what he was actually capable of. Kneeling down in front of her to look her in the eyes he said, "You don't have to be scared Moegi, I will keep my promise as long as you keep yours,"

After he saw her nod and a slight smile appear on her lips he gave her a little hug and said, "Just make sure you train really hard over the next month ok?"

Over the next month Naruto and Anko' training intensified to a degree that only they could perform, because of what Naruto had done by breaking the cursed seal he had increased Anko' maximum chakra capacity by 20%. Naruto' days were still the same as they had been over the passed weeks mornings with Hinata, Neji had told her about his conversation with Naruto but she didn't care all that much about the time he spent with the other girls as long as she got her time with him as well. His afternoons were spent training with Anko, and at least once a week she would spend the night over at Naruto' where all they did was hold each other while sleeping and talk long into the night, she had also asked him to resize some more clothes for her that she had bought so that they fit her as well as the others. His early evenings were still spent with Sakura and when he told her what the other two not mentioning Anko' name she was of course jealous but came to the same decision as Hinata had, and now they kissed each other goodnight every night.

The day before the finals when Naruto and Anko were recovering from their training session Anko suddenly said, "There is nothing else for me to teach you Naruto, you have completed your training, so here is your forehead protector." Anko said holding it out to him, Naruto looked at it for a moment and then looked at her, he walked up to her as if to take it but kept getting closer to her, when he was mere inches from her he reached up behind her head and untied her forehead protector and stepping back from her a little he then tied it onto his sword strap so that it was running diagonally across his chest with the metal plate resting just left of center over his heart and said, "Thank you Anko, I can never repay you for what you have given me." After she had strapped his onto her sword strap the same way he had hers, she took a step towards him closing the distance between them she looks up into his face and so motioning him down with her finger, "I have something else for you." She then grabs the collar of his jacket and pulls him into a heated kiss, Naruto knew exactly what she was about to do and so slips an arm around her waist to pull her body up against his, when she gasped in surprise at his actions Naruto deepens the kiss and moves his tongue into her mouth to gently caress hers with his, after her initial shock she realizes that she is already kissing him back with such passion that it almost scares her. Pulling back from the kiss after a few minutes Naruto looks at her innocently and asks, "So what was that for?"

Breathing heavily she answers, "It was for luck of course." And blushing deeply she kisses him again before quickly pulling away again and saying, "That one was because I love you."

After she said that Naruto looked so sad it almost broke her heart, "I wish that I could say that I love you too, but I just don't know yet, but what I can tell you that is completely true is that you are in my heart, and will always be just as Hinata and Sakura are in there as well."

"I know Naruto, I know and I am fine with that I swear I just want you to be happy just as I know that you want us to be." And with that she hugged him.

Entering the arena for the finals the first thing that Naruto did was head towards where the Kage' were sitting, although someone heading to the Kage' would be stopped and questioned by ANBU and the Sand' guard' Naruto was not, he simply walked up to them and gave a slight bow to them both before receiving a hug from Tsunade and a hand shake from Gaara, "It's good to see you again Gaara, you look better then the last time I saw you, I guess you've probably been able to get some decent sleep now though." Naruto said with a little smirk.

"It's good to see you again also Naruto, and yes without Shukaku I am now able to sleep in peace without the fear of losing control." Gaara said in his flat voice but Naruto could still hear the amusement in it, even if no one else could.

"Good, now before I leave for the competitor's area I have one thing to say, I want Tsunade-Kaasan to check you out before you leave, just to make sure that there are no ill effects from you being dead and all." And so with a smirk and a wave Naruto left them to talk amongst them selves and watch the matches to come.

The first match was between Maru and one of the Sand where Maru was beaten, but barely, for he did put up one hell of a fight, the second match was fairly typical but of no real interest to Naruto. Naruto' match was the third one to be fought and so he escorted Moegi down to the arena floor, while they were walking he was giving her a pep talk and telling her to show everyone just how good she was.  
Once the match started the crowd noticed that Naruto was only defending himself and never attacked his opponent or even counter attacked, about 10 minutes into the fight Naruto noticed that Moegi was breathing fairly heavily and decided to pause the match for a moment so she could catch her breath, so raising his hand to her to stop her attack he said, "You're pretty good Moegi, I can see that you've trained very hard, actually you're very good at Taijutsu and I think you could become extremely good under the right trainer," Moegi was shocked to hear him say that and she blushed a little before he continued, "Would you like me to find you a Taijutsu trainer?" He asked.  
"Yes please." Moegi replied nodding her head emphatically.  
Hearing her answer Naruto looked over to the crowd and yelled out, "Hey, Rock Lee you out there?"  
"Naruto I'm over here." Hearing a shouted response from behind him he turned around and saw the junior green beast waving his arms in the air.  
Still shouting Naruto said, "Lee, I know you're busy with missions and your own training but do you think you could help Moegi with her Taijutsu? I'm sure that with you training her, with the help of Gai of course, that she could become almost as good as you at the least."  
"I would be honored Naruto." Lee replied with tears running down his face.  
From where they were standing in the arena Naruto could hear the mutterings of the crowd with most being along the lines of 'Is she his opponent or his student' looking up at Lee again he yells, "Thanks Lee you two can talk after the match ok? Just do me one favor though, don't push your fashion sense onto her." He finished with a smile hearing the laughter of the crowd and then turned back to face Moegi and saw that she had recovered some and so indicated that they could now continue with the match.  
Another 10 minutes later and Naruto raised his hand to Moegi to stop and said to her, "You're out of chakra now Moegi, it's time for you to uphold your promise." Nodding her head to him she turned to the proctor of the match and told him that she gives up, when the proctor announced Naruto was the winner there was silence in the arena until Naruto turned to the crowd and shouted, "How about a round of applause for Moegi here she did very well." And started clapping for her, soon after the rest of the crowd joined in with him and then the shouts and cheers came not long after, walking up to her he said, "Seeing how well you did how would you like to see something beautiful?" With her nod Naruto went through a series of hand seals and muttered 'Ikimono-Supai Jutsu' and there in the arena appeared tens of thousands of butterflies, all different sizes and colors, to those that witnessed the event it would always be known as the living rainbow, when the butterflies appeared the crowd fell silent in wonderment never before had they seen something like this. After a moment the butterflies began flying amongst the crowd, but there was three that had a particular target, a pink one was sent to Sakura, lavender and purple one to Hinata and a black and white one was sent to Anko, when they reached their targets they landed on their chest over their hearts and then they dissolved leaving an imprint on their clothing of the butterfly that landed on them, but what they didn't know at the time which they would find out later that night was that they had also imprinted onto their skin like a tattoo, once he had dissipated the rest of the butterflies in a shower of sparks the crowd erupted in applause.

After Naruto had won the tournament, without even needing to draw his sword, his three girls rushed to him and hugged him together, to say that the spectators were a little shocked and amused was clearly an understatement, but Naruto bared with it and gave everyone his mischievous smirk and hugged the girls back and kissed each on the cheek.


End file.
